bobbyw24
10-18-2009, 06:48 AM
The world's future is being decided this weekend
We must agree to halt deforestation and curtail air travel now if the Copenhagen summit is to succeed
Energy and environment ministers from the world's major economies are meeting in London today to try to accelerate crucial negotiations over an international treaty on climate change.
Strong progress has been made in the past few weeks, with Japan, for example, announcing that it will cut its emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by 25% by 2020 relative to levels in 1990.
But there are still major obstacles and some doubt whether a strong global deal can be hammered out in time for the United Nations's conference on climate change in Copenhagen, now just seven weeks away.
Agreement can be reached if governments now focus on the key issue: the required overall reduction in emissions, with rich countries taking the lead through strong, binding targets and financial support for developing countries. Numbers are important to this, so let me explain why.
Global emissions of greenhouse gases in 2010 are likely to be about 47bn tonnes of carbon-dioxide-equivalent (they may have exceeded 50bn tonnes without the global economic slowdown). Countries around the world have been designing programmes that could reduce annual emissions to about 49bn tonnes of carbon-dioxide-equivalent in 2020, compared with 55 to 60bn tonnes under "business as usual".
However, to have a reasonable chance of cost-effectively limiting a rise in global average temperature to no more than 2˚C, beyond which scientists regard as "dangerous" to go, annual emissions must be reduced to below 44bn tonnes by 2020, well below 35bn tonnes in 2030 and well below 20bn tonnes by 2050.
Put another way, today's average world emissions per capita are nearly 7 tonnes of carbon-dioxide-equivalent each year, with big variations between countries: for instance, the United States emits about 24 tonnes per head while the figure for India is below 2 tonnes.
By 2050, the global population is projected to rise to 9 billion, so average per head emissions will have to be lower than 2 tonnes per year on average. For rich countries, this will require a cut in annual emissions by at least 80% by 2050.
But given that China's emissions are 6 tonnes per head and growing, and that today's developing countries will be home to 8 billion people in 2050, it is clear that they must also be at the heart of the action on climate change.
So we must find a further cut of 5bn tonnes on top of current intentions for 2020. This is achievable. For example, greater efforts on tackling deforestation could reduce emissions cost-effectively by at least another 2.5bn tonnes. International shipping and aviation could further reduce the global total by at least half a billion tonnes.
The rich countries could also reduce the global total by more than a billion tonnes if they implement their conditional "high-ambition" commitments – the European Union, for instance, will increase its cuts by 2020, relative to 1990 levels, from 20% to 30% if there is a strong global deal.
Developing countries could also make a similar contribution through finding improved ways of achieving economic growth while lowering their emissions per unit of output. In both rich and poor countries, there is great potential both from energy efficiency and new low-emissions technologies.
All of this can be achieved in the next decade with carefully designed policies. Indeed, if we set out strongly on this road we will create a new era of prosperity and growth. Innovators are full of ideas and investors see the opportunities. They now need confidence in strong international policy.
Many developing countries have already drawn up detailed plans for making the transition to a low-carbon economy and have taken significant steps forward in the last few weeks.
For instance, Hu Jintao, the Chinese president, announced last month at a United Nations summit in New York that his country will cut carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product by a "notable margin" by 2020 compared with levels in 2005.
Jairam Ramesh, the Indian environment minister, last weekend outlined a series of important measures that his country intends to take across a wide range of sectors, including the goal of obtaining a fifth of its energy from solar, wind and hydro sources by 2020.
Rich countries must give their backing to these plans by providing developing countries with $100bn a year by the early 2020s, for measures to reduce emissions (much of which could be delivered by the operation of carbon markets), and a further $100bn to help them adapt to the effects of climate change that cannot now be avoided. Developing countries are likely to doubt the credibility of such commitments unless the rich countries also set an intermediate target of $50bn per year by 2015.
These sums must be over and above current commitments on official development assistance. They may appear large, but $200bn represents around 0.5% of the current gross domestic product of the rich countries, and is tiny compared to the risks that can be avoided by an international agreement. And it will not be possible to overcome poverty in poor countries without also tackling the threat of climate change: the global deal must be founded on a clear understanding that these two issues are closely bound together.
An ambitious deal on climate change that is effective, efficient and equitable is within our grasp, but only if our political leaders remain focused on the core common goals and maintain their determination to reach agreement.
Lord Stern is chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and IG Patel professor of economics and government at the London School of Economics and Political Science
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14 Oct 2009
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The world's future is being decided this weekend | Nicholas Stern
This article appeared on p31 of the Comment section of the Observer on Sunday 18 October 2009. It was published on guardian.co.uk at 00.20 BST on Sunday 18 October 2009.
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HeavydutyJudy's profile picture HeavydutyJudy
18 Oct 09, 12:28am (about 13 hours ago)
You aint curtailing my air travel mate , not one bit.
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wormsatone's profile picture wormsatone
18 Oct 09, 12:33am (about 13 hours ago)
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MoveAnyMountain's profile picture MoveAnyMountain
18 Oct 09, 12:34am (about 13 hours ago)
So it looks like more of the same to me. Everyone is promising to meet targets that they know they will not meet. The Japanese perhaps but the Europeans are past masters at hypocrisy on this. All for a problem that probably does not even exist. Great. I like this:
These sums must be over and above current commitments on official development assistance. They may appear large, but $200bn represents around 0.5% of the current gross domestic product of the rich countries, and is tiny compared to the risks that can be avoided by an international agreement.
Of course that is not even close to the costs of this deal. Reducing our CO2 emissions by 80% will probably reduce our wealth by the same amount or more. So we are not going to be in a position to give anyone anything. On top of which all the evidence shows that giving aid to Third World countries only makes them poorer. So it will not even help.
An ambitious deal on climate change that is effective, efficient and equitable is within our grasp, but only if our political leaders remain focused on the core common goals and maintain their determination to reach agreement.
This is an inspiring conclusion. A pity that there is nothing whatsoever in the preceeding article to suggest it is true. There is no sign that this deal will be any more "effective" than the utterly ignored Kyoto deal. There is no sign that handing over money to corrupt dictators is efficient, and closing down our most efficient economic sectors is not going to help either. And equitable? Taking money from poor First World people to give to rich Third World ones is not equity in my book.
It would be better not to go to Copenhagen. Save all those air fares.
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emale's profile picture emale
18 Oct 09, 12:41am (about 13 hours ago)
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18 Oct 09, 12:55am (about 13 hours ago)
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BoudiccaBrent's profile picture BoudiccaBrent
18 Oct 09, 1:03am (about 13 hours ago)
It is not so much climate change that needs to be addressed. It is over population, but hardly anyone talks about that.
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Fomalhaut88's profile picture Fomalhaut88
18 Oct 09, 1:16am (about 12 hours ago)
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Kimpatsu's profile picture Kimpatsu
18 Oct 09, 1:46am (about 12 hours ago)
We must... curtail air travel now
Two questions.
1. Have you ever attended a conference like Copenhagen?
2. How did you get there.
When Lord Stern says "we must curtail air travel", he means that the rest of us should stop flying and be confined to our small island home, whilst he and his fellow politicians gallivant around the world at our expense. What hypocrisy!
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legjoints's profile picture legjoints
18 Oct 09, 2:03am (about 12 hours ago)
BoudiccaBrent
It is not so much climate change that needs to be addressed. It is over population, but hardly anyone talks about that.
George Monbiot discussed the issue of population on this site a few weeks ago, and has discussed it on numerous occasions, as have many others.
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dirkbruere's profile picture dirkbruere
18 Oct 09, 2:04am (about 12 hours ago)
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legjoints's profile picture legjoints
18 Oct 09, 2:07am (about 12 hours ago)
Kimpatsu
the rest of us should stop flying and be confined to our small island home
You know there's a tunnel that goes under the channel now, and you can get a train from the UK to just about anywhere in Europe.
By the way, curtail does not mean stop.
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synthpop's profile picture synthpop
18 Oct 09, 2:10am (about 12 hours ago)
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18 Oct 09, 2:30am (about 11 hours ago)
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18 Oct 09, 2:42am (about 11 hours ago)
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PaulGMorris's profile picture PaulGMorris
18 Oct 09, 3:00am (about 11 hours ago)
Lord Stern's points are all clear and fair. We need to avoid deforestation, we need to reduce air travel (however unpopular that may be), we need to move rapidly towards sustainable living and to help developing countries also move towards sustainability.
Those who have doubts about the science can review accessible articles in journals such as Science, Scientific American, New Scientist, Nature etc. Doubt exists only in blogs, popular media and the minds of deniers, encouraged by oil industry lobbyists and other vested interests.
Anyone willing to read through a selection of peer reviewed scientific articles will note that the overwhelming majority accept that climate change will have dramatic effects and is caused by emissions of greenhouse gases (e.g. CO2).
The implications may be inconvenient, but the consequences of inaction will be far more severe.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/oct/18/nicholas-stern-carbon-emission
We must agree to halt deforestation and curtail air travel now if the Copenhagen summit is to succeed
Energy and environment ministers from the world's major economies are meeting in London today to try to accelerate crucial negotiations over an international treaty on climate change.
Strong progress has been made in the past few weeks, with Japan, for example, announcing that it will cut its emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by 25% by 2020 relative to levels in 1990.
But there are still major obstacles and some doubt whether a strong global deal can be hammered out in time for the United Nations's conference on climate change in Copenhagen, now just seven weeks away.
Agreement can be reached if governments now focus on the key issue: the required overall reduction in emissions, with rich countries taking the lead through strong, binding targets and financial support for developing countries. Numbers are important to this, so let me explain why.
Global emissions of greenhouse gases in 2010 are likely to be about 47bn tonnes of carbon-dioxide-equivalent (they may have exceeded 50bn tonnes without the global economic slowdown). Countries around the world have been designing programmes that could reduce annual emissions to about 49bn tonnes of carbon-dioxide-equivalent in 2020, compared with 55 to 60bn tonnes under "business as usual".
However, to have a reasonable chance of cost-effectively limiting a rise in global average temperature to no more than 2˚C, beyond which scientists regard as "dangerous" to go, annual emissions must be reduced to below 44bn tonnes by 2020, well below 35bn tonnes in 2030 and well below 20bn tonnes by 2050.
Put another way, today's average world emissions per capita are nearly 7 tonnes of carbon-dioxide-equivalent each year, with big variations between countries: for instance, the United States emits about 24 tonnes per head while the figure for India is below 2 tonnes.
By 2050, the global population is projected to rise to 9 billion, so average per head emissions will have to be lower than 2 tonnes per year on average. For rich countries, this will require a cut in annual emissions by at least 80% by 2050.
But given that China's emissions are 6 tonnes per head and growing, and that today's developing countries will be home to 8 billion people in 2050, it is clear that they must also be at the heart of the action on climate change.
So we must find a further cut of 5bn tonnes on top of current intentions for 2020. This is achievable. For example, greater efforts on tackling deforestation could reduce emissions cost-effectively by at least another 2.5bn tonnes. International shipping and aviation could further reduce the global total by at least half a billion tonnes.
The rich countries could also reduce the global total by more than a billion tonnes if they implement their conditional "high-ambition" commitments – the European Union, for instance, will increase its cuts by 2020, relative to 1990 levels, from 20% to 30% if there is a strong global deal.
Developing countries could also make a similar contribution through finding improved ways of achieving economic growth while lowering their emissions per unit of output. In both rich and poor countries, there is great potential both from energy efficiency and new low-emissions technologies.
All of this can be achieved in the next decade with carefully designed policies. Indeed, if we set out strongly on this road we will create a new era of prosperity and growth. Innovators are full of ideas and investors see the opportunities. They now need confidence in strong international policy.
Many developing countries have already drawn up detailed plans for making the transition to a low-carbon economy and have taken significant steps forward in the last few weeks.
For instance, Hu Jintao, the Chinese president, announced last month at a United Nations summit in New York that his country will cut carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product by a "notable margin" by 2020 compared with levels in 2005.
Jairam Ramesh, the Indian environment minister, last weekend outlined a series of important measures that his country intends to take across a wide range of sectors, including the goal of obtaining a fifth of its energy from solar, wind and hydro sources by 2020.
Rich countries must give their backing to these plans by providing developing countries with $100bn a year by the early 2020s, for measures to reduce emissions (much of which could be delivered by the operation of carbon markets), and a further $100bn to help them adapt to the effects of climate change that cannot now be avoided. Developing countries are likely to doubt the credibility of such commitments unless the rich countries also set an intermediate target of $50bn per year by 2015.
These sums must be over and above current commitments on official development assistance. They may appear large, but $200bn represents around 0.5% of the current gross domestic product of the rich countries, and is tiny compared to the risks that can be avoided by an international agreement. And it will not be possible to overcome poverty in poor countries without also tackling the threat of climate change: the global deal must be founded on a clear understanding that these two issues are closely bound together.
An ambitious deal on climate change that is effective, efficient and equitable is within our grasp, but only if our political leaders remain focused on the core common goals and maintain their determination to reach agreement.
Lord Stern is chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and IG Patel professor of economics and government at the London School of Economics and Political Science
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14 Oct 2009
US bids for bilateral climate change deals with China and India
16 Sep 2009
Chinese government adviser warns that 2C global warming target is unrealistic
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Putting people before profit | Alistair Alexander
19 Aug 2009
BP and Shell warned to halt campaign against US climate change bill
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The world's future is being decided this weekend | Nicholas Stern
This article appeared on p31 of the Comment section of the Observer on Sunday 18 October 2009. It was published on guardian.co.uk at 00.20 BST on Sunday 18 October 2009.
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HeavydutyJudy's profile picture HeavydutyJudy
18 Oct 09, 12:28am (about 13 hours ago)
You aint curtailing my air travel mate , not one bit.
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wormsatone's profile picture wormsatone
18 Oct 09, 12:33am (about 13 hours ago)
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MoveAnyMountain's profile picture MoveAnyMountain
18 Oct 09, 12:34am (about 13 hours ago)
So it looks like more of the same to me. Everyone is promising to meet targets that they know they will not meet. The Japanese perhaps but the Europeans are past masters at hypocrisy on this. All for a problem that probably does not even exist. Great. I like this:
These sums must be over and above current commitments on official development assistance. They may appear large, but $200bn represents around 0.5% of the current gross domestic product of the rich countries, and is tiny compared to the risks that can be avoided by an international agreement.
Of course that is not even close to the costs of this deal. Reducing our CO2 emissions by 80% will probably reduce our wealth by the same amount or more. So we are not going to be in a position to give anyone anything. On top of which all the evidence shows that giving aid to Third World countries only makes them poorer. So it will not even help.
An ambitious deal on climate change that is effective, efficient and equitable is within our grasp, but only if our political leaders remain focused on the core common goals and maintain their determination to reach agreement.
This is an inspiring conclusion. A pity that there is nothing whatsoever in the preceeding article to suggest it is true. There is no sign that this deal will be any more "effective" than the utterly ignored Kyoto deal. There is no sign that handing over money to corrupt dictators is efficient, and closing down our most efficient economic sectors is not going to help either. And equitable? Taking money from poor First World people to give to rich Third World ones is not equity in my book.
It would be better not to go to Copenhagen. Save all those air fares.
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emale's profile picture emale
18 Oct 09, 12:41am (about 13 hours ago)
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artwest's profile picture artwest
18 Oct 09, 12:55am (about 13 hours ago)
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BoudiccaBrent's profile picture BoudiccaBrent
18 Oct 09, 1:03am (about 13 hours ago)
It is not so much climate change that needs to be addressed. It is over population, but hardly anyone talks about that.
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Fomalhaut88's profile picture Fomalhaut88
18 Oct 09, 1:16am (about 12 hours ago)
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Kimpatsu's profile picture Kimpatsu
18 Oct 09, 1:46am (about 12 hours ago)
We must... curtail air travel now
Two questions.
1. Have you ever attended a conference like Copenhagen?
2. How did you get there.
When Lord Stern says "we must curtail air travel", he means that the rest of us should stop flying and be confined to our small island home, whilst he and his fellow politicians gallivant around the world at our expense. What hypocrisy!
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legjoints's profile picture legjoints
18 Oct 09, 2:03am (about 12 hours ago)
BoudiccaBrent
It is not so much climate change that needs to be addressed. It is over population, but hardly anyone talks about that.
George Monbiot discussed the issue of population on this site a few weeks ago, and has discussed it on numerous occasions, as have many others.
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dirkbruere's profile picture dirkbruere
18 Oct 09, 2:04am (about 12 hours ago)
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legjoints's profile picture legjoints
18 Oct 09, 2:07am (about 12 hours ago)
Kimpatsu
the rest of us should stop flying and be confined to our small island home
You know there's a tunnel that goes under the channel now, and you can get a train from the UK to just about anywhere in Europe.
By the way, curtail does not mean stop.
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synthpop's profile picture synthpop
18 Oct 09, 2:10am (about 12 hours ago)
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18 Oct 09, 2:19am (about 11 hours ago)
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18 Oct 09, 2:30am (about 11 hours ago)
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18 Oct 09, 2:42am (about 11 hours ago)
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18 Oct 09, 2:51am (about 11 hours ago)
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18 Oct 09, 2:57am (about 11 hours ago)
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PaulGMorris's profile picture PaulGMorris
18 Oct 09, 3:00am (about 11 hours ago)
Lord Stern's points are all clear and fair. We need to avoid deforestation, we need to reduce air travel (however unpopular that may be), we need to move rapidly towards sustainable living and to help developing countries also move towards sustainability.
Those who have doubts about the science can review accessible articles in journals such as Science, Scientific American, New Scientist, Nature etc. Doubt exists only in blogs, popular media and the minds of deniers, encouraged by oil industry lobbyists and other vested interests.
Anyone willing to read through a selection of peer reviewed scientific articles will note that the overwhelming majority accept that climate change will have dramatic effects and is caused by emissions of greenhouse gases (e.g. CO2).
The implications may be inconvenient, but the consequences of inaction will be far more severe.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/oct/18/nicholas-stern-carbon-emission